Posted Oct 15, 2009, 7:20 PM
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Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: B3K Halifax, NS
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Frustration boils over loss of green space
Residents angry Dartmouth Common land will be used for new bus terminal
Halifax News Net
By Joanie Veitch – The Weekly News
The draft plans look good overall, but building a new bus terminal should not trump preserving Common land.
That was the message residents continued to hammer at the team working on the Dartmouth Common Master Plan at last week’s public meeting.
For nearly two hours of the three-hour meeting, hosted by HRM planning staff and CBCL consultants, people voiced similar concerns about the bus terminal expansion.
“The Dartmouth Common is the Dartmouth Common and it should not be used as a bus terminal. The whole thing should be revisited,” said Trevor Parsons, a local realtor and longtime resident of Dartmouth.
At issue is Metro Transit’s plan to expand the bridge terminal into the urban wilderness area above the Dartmouth Sportsplex parking lot. The original expansion plan ran the terminal approximately three acres up Nantucket Avenue. In addition to criticism at the loss of more green space, that plan drew criticism when first announced this past spring as it could pose security concerns for the nearby Dartmouth High School.
That configuration is still on the table in two of the four options for the Common presented at last week’s meeting. The other two options rotate the terminal to run between Nantucket and Thistle Street, along the top of the Sportsplex parking lot.
The province amended the Municipal Government Act last fall, thereby allowing the new bus terminal to use up to six acres of Dartmouth Common land. Although many people remarked that the decision to allow Metro Transit to expand onto that parcel of land was done with insufficient public input, that decision means the bus terminal will go on Dartmouth Common land and some or all of the existing urban wilderness area must be used to accommodate it, said Gordon Smith, one of the CBCL consultants hired by the city to work on the project.
“I feel as bad as you do, but that train has left the station,” he said.
“This urban woodland space once it’s gone, it will never be back as open space,” lamented resident Tom Gribbin during his turn at the mike. “I feel so sad that it is just seen as a blight to get rid of.”
One resident, however, took a different tact than most. Noting the amount of development that has already occurred on Common land, Colin May suggested the city buy the Brightwood Golf & Country Club land and call it the new Dartmouth Common.
“There’s next to nothing left,” May said. “It’s all been given away over the last 150 years to the point where we’re now fighting over a little piece of scrub land.”
Echoing that sentiment to some extent was Jean Llewellyn, who suggested that Dartmouth residents should demand “definite things” in return for giving up part of the Dartmouth Common for the new bus terminal.
“This is a huge thing we are giving up so it requires great remuneration,” she said.
The comments expressed were consistent with what the consultation team has heard since the first public meeting in April, said HRM’s Holly Richardson, in an interview following the meeting.
“This community knows what it wants and doesn’t want. We have had excellent feedback all through this process,” she said.
The proposed plans presented by CBCL aim to redefine the Dartmouth Common as a landmark destination in HRM, with clear entrance points, trails, a new pro-size soccer and football field, an outdoor skating rink, amphitheatre and historical interpretation, highlighting sites such as the First Nations burial site in St. Peter’s Cemetery and the old Park School site.
The final report on the plan is expected by the end of the year.
joanie.veitch@gmail.com
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